Germans pinpoint 9/11 suspects

5 in custody in various countries

2 remain fugitives

October 22, 2002|By John Crewdson, Tribune senior correspondent.

HAMBURG, Germany — In the 13 months since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, German investigators have identified nine individuals still living who they believe played roles of varying significance in the events leading up to Sept. 11, 2001.

Five are in custody, two are being sought and two remain under investigation. All are linked in various ways to Al Qaeda and Mohamed Atta, the former Hamburg university student suspected of leading the hijacking plot and piloting one of the two planes that hit the World Trade Center.

A senior German intelligence official said he believes the current scorecard covers everyone with a Hamburg connection who helped to plan, finance or carry out the hijackings, although "there may be people still in Hamburg who had a certain knowledge" of what was being planned.

Those individuals, whom the official declined to identify, are not suspected of having contributed materially to the hijacking plot or necessarily of approving of the plan. More information about who they are is expected to emerge at the trial of one of the suspects, Mounir El Motassadeq, set to begin Tuesday in Hamburg.

Meanwhile, investigators are assessing the potential importance of the recent recognition that several of the Sept. 11 suspects hail from the ancient Syrian trading city of Aleppo, once a stronghold of the Muslim Brotherhood, an ultra-militant Islamic fundamentalist group that predates Al Qaeda by several decades.

In particular, they wonder whether it was something other than happenstance that Atta, who came to Hamburg from Cairo in 1992 to study urban design at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg, chose to write his thesis on the architecture of Aleppo.

IN U.S. CUSTODY:

Ramzi Binalshibh, 30. A native of Yemen and part-time German-language student at Hamburg Tech who shared Atta's apartment, Binalshibh remained behind in Hamburg to handle logistical details and money transfers to Atta and fellow hijackers Marwan Al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah in the United States. Alerted by Atta that the hijackings would occur on Sept. 11, Binalshibh fled Hamburg on Sept. 5 for Pakistan. Charged by German prosecutors with conspiracy in planning the attacks, Binalshibh was captured last month after a shootout in Karachi, Pakistan. In an interview recorded by an Arab television channel before his arrest, Binalshibh claimed a major role in carrying out the Sept. 11 plot. He has not been charged by the U.S.

IN GERMAN CUSTODY:

Mounir El Motassadeq, 28. A Moroccan engineering student at Hamburg Technical University, Motassadeq was arrested last Nov. 28 and later charged with assisting the Hamburg hijackers in such ways as paying their utility bills, rent and tuition fees after they had moved to Florida. Motassadeq also signed Atta's Islamic will and allegedly traveled to Afghanistan at the same time as one of Atta's former roommates, Sept. 11 suspect Zakariya Essabar. His lawyer says Motassadeq denies having advance knowledge of Sept. 11.

Abdelghani Mzoudi, 29. Another Hamburg Tech student from Morocco, Mzoudi moved into Atta's apartment in September 1999, replacing accused Sept. 11 conspirator Said Bahaji, who had left to get married. Like Motassadeq, Mzoudi was a signatory to Atta's will. Police say Mzoudi was among a group of Muslim radicals who pledged themselves to martyrdom in a Hamburg bookstore in April 2002. Questioned by police in July 2002 and released, Mzoudi was re-arrested Oct. 10 and charged with having assisted the hijackers. Police say they have evidence that Mzoudi visited Afghanistan at the same time as Essabar and Motassadeq, and lent Essabar several hundred dollars as a down payment for flying lessons that Essabar never took.

IN SPANISH CUSTODY:

Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, 38. The alleged Al Qaeda leader in Spain, Yarkas is accused by a Spanish magistrate of helping "prepare and design" the Sept. 11 attacks. Yarkas was arrested in Madrid on Nov. 13, 2001, with seven other Syrians, all of whom migrated to Spain from Aleppo. After Sept. 11, Yarkas' phone number was found in an address book belonging to Said Bahaji. Investigators recently learned that Yarkas was visited in Madrid in January 2000 by Abdul Fatah Zammar, a cousin of Al Qaeda's Hamburg recruiter, Mohammed Haydar Zammar, and Hamburg businessman Mamoun Darkazanli. Yarkas also is suspected of helping arrange a "summit meeting" in Spain, two months before the hijackings, that was attended by Atta and Binalshibh.